NAB chief's pay rises despite profit slump

National Australia Bank chief executive Cameron Clyne was paid $8.78 million over the past year in cash, shares and benefits, coming in slightly ahead of the previous year.

However, Mr Clyne and his top executives saw their short term cash bonus payments nearly halved over the past year as the bank’s profits went backwards.

Earlier this month NAB posted a 22 per cent drop in full-year net profit to $4.08 billion, with the bank weighed by problems in the UK. Mr Clyne has repeatedly ruled out a fire sale of the bank's UK business - centered on the Glasgow-based Clydesdale Bank, saying such a move would trigger deep shareholder losses.

Mr Clyne’s bonus payment over the year of $1.21 million was down from $2 million a year earlier.

The package, contained in NAB’s annual report, puts Mr Clyne behind his big bank rivals including ANZ’s Mike Smith who was paid the equivalent of $9.7 million and Westpac’s Gail Kelly on $9.6 million.

NAB chief financial officer Mark Joiner saw his pay package drop to $3.67 million from $4.42 million last year.

Commonwealth Bank chief executive Ian Narev got $5.7 million over the past year, although he was only in charge of the bank for seven months of the financial year.

Earlier this year, NAB sought to limit further shareholder losses in Britain by cutting 1400 jobs, closing dozens of branches and exiting commercial property loans, in response to an economy sinking deeper into recession.

NAB's Australian business marked a sharp contrast to the UK problems. The once problematic Australian personal banking unit returned a 12 per cent jump in full-year profit to $1.04 billion, with returns helped by lower bad debt charges and revenue growth.